In today’s first reading, Ex 20: 1-17, God says to the
people: “I, the Lord, am your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt,
that place of slavery. You shall not have other gods besides me. You shall not
carve idols for yourselves in the shape of anything in the sky above or on the
earth below or in the waters beneath the earth; you shall not bow down before
them or worship them.”
The worship of other gods, the carving of idols for myself—whatever
gets between me and God in such a way that I push God out of my day, out of my
thoughts, out of my musings, out of my plans, out of my hopes, out of my dreams—is
so easy to do. Without realizing it, I can fill my life, my day, my week, with God-substitutes:
work, food, alcohol/drugs, entertainment, friends, success, productivity, the
Internet, the i-pad, the smart phone, relationships; in short whatever I use as
my only means of sustenance, fulfillment, and relief without seeking God.
Sadly, as long as I am too busy carving “idols” or
God-substitutes for myself, I am denying myself the gift of knowing God as the
source of my being, the One who heals me as no one else can, the One who comforts
me like no other, the One who sustains me like no other, the One who guides me
beyond flaws, the One who has a plan full of hope for me like no other.
“I, the Lord, am your God, who brought you out of…that place
of slavery.” “I, the Lord, am your God,
who can and will free you from that which enslaves you. Trust me! I love you. I
died on the cross for you.”
The question I am left with is: Whom/what do I first seek when I feel trapped,
enslaved? Or how long do I struggle with
being enslaved before I seek God’s help, spend time quietly in solitude with the Lord? How many "side trips" do I take before laying my “chains”
at the feet of the Lord or placing them on the altar as "bread" and "wine" to be transformed by the Lord?
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